The Gilded Age, Part 2. eBook

CHAPTER X.

Only two or three days had elapsed since the funeral,
when something happened which was to change the drift
of Laura’s life somewhat, and influence in a
greater or lesser degree the formation of her character.

Major Lackland had once been a man of note in the
State—­a man of extraordinary natural ability
and as extraordinary learning. He had been universally
trusted and honored in his day, but had finally, fallen
into misfortune; while serving his third term in Congress,
and while upon the point of being elevated to the
Senate—­which was considered the summit of
earthly aggrandizement in those days—­he
had yielded to temptation, when in distress for money
wherewith to save his estate; and sold his vote.
His crime was discovered, and his fall followed instantly.
Nothing could reinstate him in the confidence of
the people, his ruin was irretrievable—­his
disgrace complete. All doors were closed against
him, all men avoided him. After years of skulking
retirement and dissipation, death had relieved him
of his troubles at last, and his funeral followed
close upon that of Mr. Hawkins. He died as he
had latterly lived—­wholly alone and friendless.
He had no relatives—­or if he had they did
not acknowledge him. The coroner’s jury
found certain memoranda upon his body and about the
premises which revealed a fact not suspected by the
villagers before-viz., that Laura was not the child
of Mr. and Mrs. Hawkins.

The gossips were soon at work. They were but
little hampered by the fact that the memoranda referred
to betrayed nothing but the bare circumstance that
Laura’s real parents were unknown, and stopped
there. So far from being hampered by this, the
gossips seemed to gain all the more freedom from it.
They supplied all the missing information themselves,
they filled up all the blanks. The town soon
teemed with histories of Laura’s origin and
secret history, no two versions precisely alike, but
all elaborate, exhaustive, mysterious and interesting,
and all agreeing in one vital particular-to-wit, that
there was a suspicious cloud about her birth, not
to say a disreputable one.

Laura began to encounter cold looks, averted eyes
and peculiar nods and gestures which perplexed her
beyond measure; but presently the pervading gossip
found its way to her, and she understood them—­then.
Her pride was stung. She was astonished, and
at first incredulous. She was about to ask her
mother if there was any truth in these reports, but
upon second thought held her peace. She soon
gathered that Major Lackland’s memoranda seemed
to refer to letters which had passed between himself
and Judge Hawkins. She shaped her course without
difficulty the day that that hint reached her.

That night she sat in her room till all was still,
and then she stole into the garret and began a search.
She rummaged long among boxes of musty papers relating
to business matters of no, interest to her, but at
last she found several bundles of letters. One
bundle was marked “private,” and in that
she found what she wanted. She selected six or
eight letters from the package and began to devour
their contents, heedless of the cold.